Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD45 → When Nothing Came
By velvetlobster, Janderson Barboza, nataliarrubio and Pza
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 126 | 3.96 | 178 | |
| Fun | 583 | 3.22 | 176 | |
| Innovation | 59 | 4.09 | 178 | |
| Theme | 322 | 3.66 | 179 | |
| Graphics | 145 | 4.19 | 180 | |
| Audio | 21 | 4.21 | 176 | |
| Mood | 12 | 4.40 | 179 |
Great game I love people that make great narrative games on a game jam, since it's one of the hardest things to do in my opinionMy heart.png I would love if you guys could add a little bit more of sound for when you connect things that are matching to aid the player a bit, but other than that it was a solid experience
thanks!! that is a very productive feedback, we would do that but we run out of time and I personally did not like the sounds we were testing on for the text feedback
Wow, I loved this. Probably my favorite so far for the art style. The walk and idle animation were great. Really loved the text placement too, it felt like a storybook. Great work!
Really awesome art style! The narrative fits the theme well. I enjoyed the time-rewinding concept as well.
This is so cool! I was hoping to try this when I saw it earlier in the posts during the jam!
Huh. I didn't really know what was going on, but there's an intense moodiness that's just captured so well. I got into the house, but on a second play I wasn't sure how to get the key to show up again. The words and clouds are clearly important, but I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with them. Any hints for getting started?
Thanks folks! some people said it was not playing in certain browser versions, could not test it though
I have no words, but it seems you had enough for the both of us. Absolutely crushed it. Pushes the boundaries of what a game can be, redefining it as interactive poetry. This tip toe through the tulips, or daisies, as the case may be, will captivate you with every lumbering step.
Wow, this is stunning! What an interesting concept, definitely want to spend some more time with this one.
This was a wonderful experience! It reminded me of magnet poetry where words and phrases can be rearranged to create new meaning. I really appreciate the deeper meaning through the game and the atmosphere and prose really came through.
This is my favorite jam game so far, thanks for making it!
@anticdope thaaaanks a lot really! I wish it was a bit more polished, some effects did not work out as we intended but were either ok or too complex to refactor .. also wanted to add more effects to the words, but placing them individually was too much work already ... most of what is there was made in a veeeery manual way lolol
I did not immediately understand that you can move letters and words. Cool idea!!!
@kooshy there is a very fast way to go to the end of the game ... 1. click plight amd he shore ... click key by the car ... enter the house 2. in house ignore everything and go to the end ... click on kind 3. go back to the outside and go to the shore again click on the earth, art and then the end
Best game I've every played in Ludum Dare 45! I love the graphics, concept and sound so much, it's artistic and poetic! I also like the way you show the texts and the interaction. It's like a visual novel, not much of gameplay, but very beautiful.
I was very confused at first but I caught on. It's a different kind of puzzle game, with good visuals and really draws you in.
This was a really cool narrative! The music and art was very nice and emotional, definitely the top game I've seen so far <3
I like the art!!! Also the gameplay is fantastic! Really enjoy the story. Cool! My favorite in this game jam now
Beautiful game. Sets the mood so well and so many things to do. Deffinitely going back and playing again soon, I want to see all of it. :) This is perfect, good job!
That is really impressive ! The graphics are amazing, as well as the sound design and the idea that is quite original. Great job to all the team for this amazing experience !
Really original game concept, I will admit I was a bit lost, but the atmosphere and visuals are fantastic and original.
Very interesting experience! It really felt like I was playing a piece of art. Everything tied together so well to set the mood of the game!
Beautiful experience. I really loved the music changing rythm and the story. I'm a huuuge fan of this kind of games.
Interesting game and cool music)
I really loved the music and reverse effect. Also the world was being built as you walk through felt like quite a good story telling.
The game is art, there is nothing more to add, except for worn-out epithets, magnificent, incredible, impressive!
Despite not being fan of this sort of game, enjoyed the game a lot! Impressive work!
A very interesting interactive game. Rewind time, music, style, I liked everything, thanks.
Amazing experience, one of the best games, the interaction with the texts is amazing and the story really well written ^^.
i had a bit of trouble at first and i was disappointed i couldn't go next the bridge, then i saw i could click stuff :p oops
by the way i enjoyed it and found it really cute, it has a nice concept and art, i like how you arranged the text.
thank you for creating it!
Good interactive story! Love the art style, so simple and stylish. The use of text is creative, it was fun to interact with words and letters. Well done!
It seems The Blue Girl paid you a visit.
"silence can be itself an art"
This was a really evocative project. I like the concept of "interactive poetry". I appreciate that you were able to craft a contained experience in the course of a single weekend, as it can be hard to know how much to realistically expect to accomplish in terms of scope. The art and music were both very good as well. Bravo! My constructive criticism would be related to ease of finding your way through the game. I had to rove back and forth and then got hung up trying to find the ending. Overall great experience though.
@terribly-awesome-games put it better than I could. A truly outstanding project. I've never been into poetry of any kind, but this left me wanting so much more. I'm going to have to go back through to try to find the extra stuff. I knew I could click on words but not that I could move them around.
Aside from being a bit confused on what to do at first, I didn't really find much to criticize. It felt super polished. The word placement was such a nice touch, it gave me mega Shel Silverstein vibes.
Thanks a lot for the valuable feedback @terribly-awesome-games , I totally agree on that, lots of people just noticed you could click and interact with words after a while, there is also the common problem in point and click adventures where you just see yourself hovering with the mouse everywhere aimlessly to find something useful or interesting ... there is lots we attempted to do and luckly a lot of it made it to the game in the end and there was not much we had to throw away ... we were trying to implement a drag and drop mechanic with the words but that ended up being far too complex for the time we had ... another feature we wasted quite some time implementing was a mechanic where you could drag a single letter of a word and the whole sentence would follow like a rope ... far too complex and ambitious so we dropped the idea afterwards ... also luckly the frame by frame animation on the main char worked on the first time, that kind of animation is very very time consuming ... the environment itself was quite simple since it uses very simple drawings with some effects that were quite easy to implement, that was a wise accidental decision lol, otherwise the project would not have been possible
thank you all for playing and thank you for the feedback @nathan-wash , btw, something that not many people find is that you can actually click on objects like the vase over the fireplace or the penguin over the fridge, or the toys in the bedroom ... we finished this version of the project just barely meeting the deadline so there was not much time to implement anything else, which made it a bit confusing
Wow this is amazing! Love the art style, music, and the poetry. Also really enjoyed the reverse record slowing down effect when you move backward..did you use middleware for that or some other workaround? Really cool stuff!
This game is really emotional and the music is beautiful! Thank you for making this!
thank you all for playing! @amerigo-gazaway actually that was quite a workaround, we developed a very tricky thing in which a counter would keep track on where you were in the music and then calculate where in the reverse music to seek so that the reverse music would always be in sync with the non reverse music ... in the end though ... although that worked, it was just not so cool .... so we switched to a simpler approach, we play a rewind sound and then loop another rewind "music" so it seems as if it was rewinding but actually isnt ... i know the ideal would be to use something as FMod, but as no one had ever done that and that would depend on lots of complexity perhaps ... the simplest workaround was the way to go, so I am really glad you liked it ... the rest of it was just a simple change on the timescale when you are rewinding
Very much a stand-out submission! I enjoyed it. It can definitely feel a bit disorienting, but I think the game eventually eases you into it shortly after you get into the house. Would've maybe liked some more puzzles -- I don't remember anything that I really considered a puzzle besides the "key" segment. The poetry was nice, though, and the ending heartfelt.
So poetic, I had a small tear in the corner of my eye at the end. Great game :) When I entered the house I thought I was still outside and I clicked the door believing it would let me enter. I was stuck few minutes trying to click everywhere.
So good, congrats people. I would love more of this, it's really touchy.
Very cool and artistic experience. This game sets a mood right from the start, and it proceeds to suck you right in. The music and art are both fantastic, and as the composer for our game, I'm very interested in the process your team used for writing and recording this music. It's lovely and has so much character! You should be very proud of this game. Great job!
I am so glad that you could feel that @bozarre , thanks a lot for playing it, there are indeed a few bugs I imagine could happen when you click to fast on things ... not sure i would be able to fix them fast enough ... thank you all for playing, will see and rate your games now
Hi @ropedog, thanks for the comments. You can send a message to the composer, I think he is awesome, here is his soundcloud https://soundcloud.com/janyork
This is lovely! It has such a strong style/mood to it - there's so much personality in the character animation, and it's really appealing the way objects and words fall into place (and go back if you rewind.) The poetry is evocative and I loved how the words were arranged. And the music is wonderful. I think it's really admirable that you made something so personal and thoughtful.
Hi @ropedog , thanks for the comment! I was really impressed with the end result!
My creation process was something I usually do at Jams, set an instrument limit and let the imagination flow just by using them, most of the instruments are from LABS Spitifire and Addictive Keys, I just love their sound ...
I also opted not to follow a fixed BPM, I think this helped to connect with the movement of the animations ...
I didn't fully understood how to play, but it's a cool experience!! Graphices and music are great, and the game is super moody! Great job!
My favorite game jam game yet! Standout elements: * The changes in music and poetry with changes in directionality – made it feel richer and deeper than a small 5-min puzzle game. I wanted to explore every possible back and forth combo! * The hidden clickable words in the poetry were subtle, just hard enough to discover to be satisfying without being too esoteric/frustrating. * Gorgeous animation. Clean and simple, with great use of color for added emphasis/flourish. Amazing job, team!!
Solid game overall. I finished it, but it's hard to tell whether I explored everything. Maybe it's just me... Very nice work! Keep it up!
This game is great. It's possible to kinda speedrun it by just mashing left/right or mashing right while left is held, but otherwise I love it.
This is so so charming and sweet. I love that you can play around with the words, and that poetry was involved!! Such a lovely concept.
These are just my impressions as I went through it: Before starting, I wanted to say I really like the description of what went into creating this game (art piece?); I think it is great you decided to make something so personal. Oh, is it a walking flower, or someone holding a flower? I am not sure what I can click on, so I just click on everything. Woah! Going backwards spooked me. The sound is a bit loud. But at least you can "travel" back fast. The music is unsettling, but it fits the mood. It feels tragic. The second musical track feels more... sentimental? A bit hopeful. I am not sure where the key was, but I suddenly had it. I also reached the "end" but it was mostly accidental, I believe. It was interesting, the way certain words behaved when you clicked them.
Overall it was a very interesting experience, memorable. :) I hope you will create more things in this "genre" in future, if it's something that interests you.
Really enjoyed this interactive puzzle poem. What a wonderful idea, and you pulled it off beautifully! I also would like to see you make more games like this. The forward/rewind feature made me think of the handheld gaming system that's coming out called playdate. It'd be cool to see something like this on there.
A beautiful game:beautiful art, story and music, with clever interactions, I like it a lot, congrats!
Definitely a unique experience! I think one of the main reason this is appreciated by many is because it is quite personal as you mentioned in the description. The art and music fit very well and the black and white art, not sure if it was intentional or because of the time limit, was very effective in my opinion. Would love to play something bigger with the same theme talking about this emotion throughout stages of life.
This was beautiful. I love the sound matching with your speed and the rewind mechanic. It fit the theme beautifully and told a great story. This was a really awersome game.
Really nice, simple but effective artwork, i like the fact that clicking the words reveals new parts of the scene (very innovative) - well done
hey guys realy cool entry my favorite thing really gotta be the art here although together with the music it created that amazing mood for the game. The best moment for me would have to be really have to be when i figured out "where" the key was =D Anyway realy realy cool
I feel like a stuck record with the number of amazing entries but this is a mind-blowingly brilliant entry, with awesome art and such a cool idea, I think it's one of my favourites by far.
I don't really know how, but from all that seemingly random word placements I really felt the rhythm of it! And with a rhythm came the feeling, not necessary a bad and sad feeling, but more of a melancholy inspired creative impulse, like the one you get when looking outside the window on a rainy day and admiring the view. You realize that there is nothing to worry about, but the feeling is yet present, and so you just go and pour it all out on a painting canvas or playing the musical instrument or in some other way.
The music was also very fitting and empowered the atmosphere really well.
So, that was an amazing little experience, but the only thing that kinda bothered me is the very abrupt reverse movement. I wish it had a bit of a slow startup and some acceleration to the full speed.
I love this game, it has great art, music, sounds, I love it when you click around to reveal more of the story, this game is full of potential and I would love to see more of it in the future.
Really cool idea and narrative! Absolutely loved the animations and being able to play with the words. If I had to say something to improve, well, the font doesn't completely fit with the rest of the art (for me). It's a nice entry, you should be proud!
What an engaging experience! The atmosphere of this game was great and the poetry beautiful, even though very puzzling from time to time. That was definitely an entertaining game to play through, so you should not be so harsh on yourself :wink:
Really beautiful experience, my fave LD45 game so far. The graphics, sound & concept all came together so well.
I thought this was a very artistic and interesting experience. You did a great job using every aspect of the design of the game to convey the message and the mood, and it came together in a very unique experience that felt like flipping the pages of an interactive storybook. I really can't wait to see more of this style of game, because it is really well executed and shows just what can be done. A testament to the power that games can have as an art form. I think there are certain instances where the audio could have served the overall feeling of the game slightly better, but overall it is still very awesome! Wonderful!
Thank you all for the comments and for playing the game. @thepiratenun , yes we indeed intend to do more of those so thanks a lot for the valuable feedback. @annie-owl really glad you liked it and found it to be entertaining =)
Love the soft tunes, it really solidified the mood! Really innovative way of telling a story, but would help if there was more hints that I had to go our of the house near the end, I was stuck in the house for awhile until I read some of the comments
Really cool and interesting game! nice job, the audio and animation is incredible!
thanks folks! Thanks for the comments @matthewjd389 ! Luckly the animation was acceptable, I spent a looong time drawing them and was afraid it would not work, I have never animated anything before and we were missing the main character (usually that is done by another artist but no one had time for that at that moment), just decided to try it and the shaking effect was actually not much intentional if you know what I mean lol (my hand was actually shaking a lot .. its very tiresome to draw something over and over), I wish I knew good softwares for animation, did those on Procreate on the ipad and tbh that was a very blind attempt, could not onion skin nor preview it anywhere before the final result ... luckly it worked it seems lol ...
@aradied yeah you are right ... I was very much afraid we would not be able to finish it so I was uncertain on how we could address that issue of players being lost on it ... had to submit like 5 minutes before the deadline and until now I do not know the best way to address that ... we will think it over and try to find a solution to that issue and try to evolve the project after the ludum dare
This was very neat. The writing and music went very well together, and the art was minimal yet impactful. I really enjoyed the style and mood you folks cultivated. One complaint I have is that using the arrow keys and mouse left my wrist a bit uncomfortable through the whole thing. I would've appreciated WASD as an option.
Really though this was well done. An interesting idea with decent execution. Nice work!
That was super cool, definitely unlike any other game I've seen so far. I was definitely confused about what to do a couple times, but that didn't really detract much from the experience. I would love to see more of this.
Agree with the other comments here, its a very cohesive atmosphere, with art and sound and story piecing together nicely. It's a bit nitpicky, but I wish wasd would have worked for movement as an alternative to arrow keys, but it wasn't really a problem. Great work!
old_friend.jpg
Thank you so much for this! It was really really moving, and I was nearly crying by the end! The aesthetics really worked, and I love the attention to detail in the animations for the objects that appear.
Now that I'm emotionally recovered, I'll try to give a little bit of nitpicky feedback: I felt like the visual feedback for unlocking new stuff when you click on words was a little too subtle, and there could be some change in how the words look after you click on them (like fading them out a little bit) Also, it would probably be good to have less draggable words. They let me a bit confused.
In general I thought the narrative and emotional experience were amazing, and would try to make the puzzle mechanics a little more intuitive and straightforward to lead the player more smoothly through the game.
I just love you managed to get to the end @tonho , and that you feld so emotionally engaged in this experience, that really makes us very happy for this project was very special for everyone of us .... btw, just some a few people found that interaction
I loved the mood, soft music, and minimalist art style! First time I had no idea what was happening, I randomly clicked stuff and suddenly it said "The End, Thank you for playing". Second time I managed to find more interactables and managed to get into the house and see more of the game which was great. Overall, a pretty good art game!
Amazing entry! I loved the art and the music. Keep making games please!
just Wow, the music and the drawings, good job. How the objects comes in and comes out, this was quite interesting and inspiring experience. One thing maybe you can add (I'm just saying maybe because I'm not sure if it could spoil this bedtime story vibe) some word or letter jumbling puzzles
nice game, i really like the style and graphics.
Amazing game! I'm speechless. The art is incredible and the gameplay make this game a great experience
This is cool, but I understood almost nothing, I accidentally rearranged something and did not see the girl with yellow hair and did not even go into the house, but they wrote to me “thanks for the game”. But from the description and comments, I realized what they wanted from me and what needed to be done. And I went through the game and read more closely what was written. This game is made with high quality). And the cool mechanics of rewinding, but it's probably a bug that when I push forward and then a bunch of times back, it turns out that I rewind time forward jerkyly. But I still wish you good luck and prosperity)!
Fantastic game! Really fun to play my guy
Hi @paulsams thanks for playing it! The idea is that you play as the sadness that invaded that girls life and then you search for her through her home, looking everywhere ... in that state she has left the house and in her thoughts she finally found comfort with the sadness that invades and that is what the ending means .... at least what it was supposed to mean lol ... I realize now that some interactions and mechanics were perhaps too abstract we will think them over once the event is over and evolve upon them, your feedback is very valuable. Some mechanics were kinda accidental too lol
Hi @finnthepirate thanks for playing, yeah we will surely work on those latter ... the letter dragging thing btw was kinda accidental, we were working on a feature that you could drag words into objects or into other words so to create cool things like dragging the word “froze” to the cloud and then it would rain ... we were having trouble with the programming part so I gave up on it but forgot to comment the dragging feature out ... just noticed it was on after people started playing and posting comments lol happy I left it on though
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@ryzy27 thanks so much for such a sweet message, it really means a lot to us <3
Super neat game! I loved the text effects and how the world assembled itself around you (reminded me of Bastion). Music is great as well.
I just wish it were clearer what to do. I did manage to get to the end of the game but I couldn't tell exactly how I did it. Are you meant to reassemble some of the phrases? If so that's really cool but I think could be accentuated with some animation and sound effects so you know you did it right. Something like a piano arpeggio to fit with the rest of the sound.
Anyways, great job.
@honey-pony thanks a lot for the feedback and the piano arpeggio is the best idea we will certainly test that once ludum dare is over. Actually the word drag feature is unfinished and was supposed to be removed in this build ... I accidentally left it on, but yes the idea was that things would happen with certain combinations and depending on where you dropped them ... we were having trouble with this feature so I gave up and thought I had removed it ... I am actually glad I didn’t because players here have found interesting ways of using that, ways I honestly did not even think of
Very nicely done. A bit confused about what does what, but it's indeed very poetic. The play on fonts works very well with the art style and the music is top notch! Congrats!
Side-note, thanks for pointing the mistake we made on our page with the disabled Graphics rating, it's now corrected!
A lovely feeling, wonderful art, nice music to go with it. I never really understood if I was solving some puzzles or if it was just enough clicking and poking around that got me further. I don't mind that too much though as it was a very interesting beautiful experience.
Wow, what a great experience. It was a little laggy in my browser, but what a great idea using point-and-click this way!
Hi @arithipathic what an interesting idea this thing about the playdate console, I will definitely look for it and see how they are getting games into that console, thanks a lot for pointing that out!
Just AWESOME! WOW, well done!
how can one find the words for love and loss how by clicking the screen and the words appear!
Wow, this was beautiful. The overall mood of the game is so good - the music is great (especially near the end), and the hand-drawn graphics are beautiful. I love how evocative it is. It was hard for me to totally follow the message of the story (even though I got it by the end) since there isn't always a direct tie between the current state of the story/what I'm seeing and the gameplay itself. I really did love this though, and am super impressed you were able to create this for a game jam. Well done!
Really interesting concept, and lovely presentation.
I had to play this twice because my first play through I just dragged every word and sentences with me to the end of the map and spend a lot of time playing with it and trying to build sentences and stuff. The second play through I took my time to focus on the text, and feeling of the game. Amazing work, good job to all of you.
I'm impressed by the execution of this. I think entertainment like this will become more and more popular. It doesn't necessarily feel *fun* to play, but it was interesting to play. If there are any negatives, it's the fact that the backwards music is rather disruptive. While I understand you probably want it like that, I personally think it should have been a bit easier on the ears.
Okay, this was a really unique experience. Really beautiful. Even though I was confused about half the time about what to do, but finally did manage to reach the end by clicking on random words...
Still, at the end I had the feeling,y'know, that you get after finishing a very good book. That sense of loss after a profound experience. Thank you for making this.
thank you all for playing and for the feedback
We are very honored to have so many people playing our game, it shows to us that perhaps this is a style we should continue working on.
@pranjalbisht that is exactly the feeling we wanted to convey in the end, glad you could feel that, we sure need to make it less confusing though, you are right about that
@dib you are right about the volume in the backward music, I thought maybe I should have made it half the volume but forgot to check that in the end
This is a _ really _ unique experience. This is one of those gems I will send to people who would probably never touch a typical Ludum Dare entry. Interactive poetry is a thing that should definitely be further explored!
Fantastic and very unique game. I really liked how it was so much based on reading (my game ended up being that as well). Great work!
Wow, this is amazing. Going backwards is really fun. I don't think I reached the ending, but that doesn't really matter in a game like this.
I really enjoyed this game, the music and the world being created as you go made the story very impactful. Your mix of text and pen-on-paper drawings actually reminded me a lot of a poetry collection called "Where the Sidewalk Ends." There was definitely room to do a lot more with the puzzle mechanics if you'd had more time, but the overall experience was amazing. Thank you for making this!
Dear God, your stylistic choices are absolutely impeccable, the art and music suit the game so well (although the music was a bit too loud for my taste). I've grown to love the writing, too, it was both gentle and melancholic. The game itself was pretty tough, so I streamed it for my friends and we beat it together!
Thank you for this experience.
I feel very moved right now, this was beautiful and the most innovative one I've seen so far, this is a great entry, the music was so fitting
Wow, that's such a beautiful experience. The atmosphere, the mood, the music and the minimalistic art style. They really worked well with each other. At first, it was confusing though. But then, I realized it. Also, I didn't like the reverse thingy when you walked backwards.
Amazing and innovative game. My only complain is that as you move with the arrows, I thought the mouse was not necessary and spent a lot of time looking for some interaction key that I was missing.
Extraordinary. The style, the game, the plot, the artistic vision. Most of the time I didn't understand what I was doing, but somehow I found the solutions and reached the end, so I had a great time and you made a well-designed game! :) I am not sure if the game really needs the "mowing time backwards" mechanics and especially the sound that comes with it (they break the mood and atmosphere a bit), but otherwise the game is super good!
Love that one, played with my LD team and had a great time. Playing alone now was also a great experience. Intense emotional game! Congrats for the team! <3
This game really is a work of art, it feels very poetic, I like the feeling going through this world. Gameplay wise it felt more like an interactive story book. For a short time I was convinced that there was a puzzle about re-arranging the letters, but then I got to the end easily by just randomly clicking on words and walking back and forth. All in all it was a good experience, thank you for this charming entry! :)
WOW... Totally unique and touching experience... I was not always certain of what I was doing but I enjoyed exploring this world and story. Art, music, interactions, this is absolutely beautiful guys. Congrats
I loved the effect when you go back ! Nice entry, well done.
WOW! fantastic game. One of my best so far, especially for the graphics, the mechanics and the overall mood. I really enjoyed playing it!
Two fives from me! What a beautiful little game! Took a while to figure the different interactivites and having to go back and forth again. It was _almost_ not bothersome, so just a wee bit of tweaking will make it magic. Loved the entire idea and execution. Again - beautiful! 🙂
Very short yet unique for an LD game! I like how you can interact with the text and that the game has secrets that players can find if they choose to. Otherwise its just a short chill story game.
FANTASTIC. PERFECT MOOD. The soundtrack is amazing, the rewind capability, the main character, the art style, the wind blowing the trees, and such nice rhymes too. Amazing. Amazing job!
I played quite a few games this jam that chose to omit instructions at the detriment of the game's experience. This game is not one of them. It's simple, intuitive, and emotion provoking. The music makes the game for me. The simple art and the drab colors strengthen the mood. The story is clear. Wonderful game.
Your team created a wonderful mood with this game. The visual style fit the game perfectly, and the gameplay mechanics felt creative and unique. Well done!
Hey, I played your game on my stream if you're interested in watching the video. (Apologies for the kinda bad audio mix)
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/494759258?t=00h24m51s
Very unique for sure and I love the ability to rewind, click pretty much everything, re-arrange words, and just explore the world at my own pace. When it says "it needs a key" I started to re-arranging letters to form a "key" (the words key) to open the it but realize there is no 'K' or 'Y'. Neat little idea :)
thank you all for playing! and thank you @weeping-rupee for recording a playthrough, it was awesome to see somebody else playing it to the end, wish I was there live to watch it. @prodigalson that is a great way to solve a puzzle, not sure how to implement that though, in future versions I will certainly include that kind of thing, clever suggestion. To find the key its currently kinda random ... you need to click on "plight" and then look close to the car, there will be a key in there ... also looking in @weeping-rupee 's stream we noticed click is not activated by dragging, so triggers require that you actually click and not drag to activate ... another thing to fix in next versions
Wow, what a great experience. Visuals, texts and music really serve the message of the game. It is touching, really. One of my favourite games for this LD. Well done!
Great game, very original. I really liked the story, the art and the mood, but what I liked the most was amazing music. Awesome job, guys!
Absolutely beautiful! I love game that take a different approach, and this was perfect for a game jam, and used the theme in an excellent way. You could tell it was something you were passionate about, and it shows in the art style, the flow of the game, and the story. The music did cut out quite early for me for some reason, but returned again after I'd explored the house which was fine. Oh, and on that, I really like how you'd be able to completely walk past the house if you weren't clicking on everything. Nice touch! Congrats on a great game :slight_smile:
So beautiful, I love the art, the narration, and especially the music. Great backward/rewinding sound effect. Fantastic job and am excited to see future entries from your team!
Getting stuck right at the start. Nothing does anything except for right arrow which makes music pitch scale to zero and breaks the trees...
https://youtu.be/X-kqFvdE4Qs
Oh and first time I run the game, before refresh, the lower half of the screen is black too. If I refresh or change tabs, the blackness disappears. Mac Chrome if that helps...
**edit:** Tried Firefox, can see the flower idle/walking animation at least. Some progress...
**edit 2:** Oh, even the left arrow works here. It actually might be working... :triumph:
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Ohh right! Thank god I got to play it, that was brilliant. I don't think I really got everything or even the most of it (the story that is) but the ending gave me shivers.
First I thought it would be some kind of Undertale homage. With the personified sunflower there and the cover pic room kinda looks similar to Toriel's living room and the Deltarune living room blended together.
The music was nice, really reminded me of Professor Layton (which is a super good thing). The art was pretty much perfect. Nice hand drawn feel with awesome simple animations like bringing in/out the stage pieces and the squiggliness of the texts. Really made the game feel alive and not be static.
Sure, it was kind of a non-game but it was interactive enough to keep me entertained at least. It's the small things that count. All the extra lore nuggets that you could find and the small interactivities that didn't even (to my knowledge) serve any purpose at all. It game the player (or me at least) something to do while, well, figuring out what to do. :blush: It was even fun to fiddle around arranging words and letters. At first I thought that might be some puzzle. And dunno, maybe it even was and I just couldn't figure it out. You did say there are loads of secrets there. My biggest goal was to get the car started, but alas, I couldn't manage to do it. If there is a way to do it, you get a big :thumbsup: from me.
The clickable words that the flower just repeated started of nice but got kinda repetitive and predictable. Could have given a bit more insight on those the further along it got or something. But then there was the dinner = :bird: thing that still haunts me.. :scream:
That's pretty much all I can say about it. There wasn't much gameplay elements, my usual main focus on critique, to feedback on. And what was there was working very much :ok_hand:
Awesome job! :heart::heart:
Bloody well done.
Fantastic little game of poetry. Love how the interaction doesn't really affect the gameplay a lot yet still manages to add so much to the entire experience.
@antti-haavikko
I am very happy you were able to enjoy and find the messages besides all the bugs and crashes, happy you gave it a chance.
Some people reported similar issues, but never seen the trees breaking ... sadly it seems that most of the problems are related to the engine we chose, which gives us a very frustrating feeling ...
About the interaction, most of them were planned, some of these worked, but a lot of those ended up incomplete
among the incomplete ones are those related to continuation of the verses ... there were supposed to be clues as to the sequence of the verses and that would make the story more clear as each part of the house was being searched. There would also be drag and drop mechanics where you would have to move words to form rhyming verses ...
also objects would react to the words being dragged into then, like the clouds that were supposed to rain or snow and plants would grow on the floor depending on the words you placed nearby ...
we also were planning on a scene where the girl would ride with the flower in the lake in a boat, a symbol of how she had learned to cope with her sadness after the end ...
less than 1 hour before the deadline we just decided to pack everything together and just guarantee that at least players would be able to reach the end, even if it was a simple end, so lots of the exploration options ended up incomplete
yes that was supposed to be a kinda of exploration instead of a challenge ... but the intention was also to offer clues about the story, which although is not linear, the poetry it forms overall kinda has different possible sequences.
yes the exploration gets quite repetitive with elements being so static (that really was not the intention) but I feel that after each Ludum Dare we get more and more prepared to do a better thing in the next one.
Overall thank you for such a detailed feedback and bug reports, that means a lot to us We will make sure to play your game right next and do our bests to provide a productive feedback
=)
<3 <3 <3
thank you all for the feedback folks! We will get back to playing your games quite soon
Wow, this was very unique. I try and imagine how difficult it is to translate an abstract idea to other members of a team and this one is something else. Loved the art and animations as well as the music.
This is a very unique demo of how interactive poetry should be done!
:point_right: Things I really liked and stood out for me: - The soundtrack fits perfectly - The rewind capability impressed me - Overall mood (wind blowing through the trees)
Really nice demo and I'm looking forward to more.
Excellent work! At first I thought the backward walking was out of place, but once I got into the game, it felt very much a part of the experience.
Took a while to get the hang of what I could and couldn't do, but wow, that was pretty good! Played it through and love the feeling you got into this, even if I didn't quite get the deeper meaning, but that's how poetry could be! Nice job!
Really cool game! It felt like an interactive poem! You might have discovered a new game genre haha! Thank you for making this beautiful game!
I really enjoyed this! beautiful art and nice soundtrack. Well done for what you achieved in such a short time! I look forward to the post-jam version :)
Really nice and relaxing game.
Nice art and mood. Interactive poetry is a pretty accurate description.
I couldnt really tell which of the actions that I did were relevant. I was basically clicking and dragging things around at random to see what would happen, and going back to places I had been before when I reached a dead end. I tried rearranging words and letters a bit to try to spell sentences, but it seems that clicking on everything was sufficient. I did eventually reach the end of the game, but I think there could have been more feedback when something significant happened.
As an aside, I would have appreciated being able to use WASD to move, since the arrow keys are awkward for me left hand to reach.
it feels blue,but warm.i love this game.the art the music the concept are so great!
Very interesting game! I included it in my Ludum Dare 45 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look :) https://youtu.be/ckBb1ej2CB8
love that everything is moving and i like the art style. the music is nice and the rewind when walking backwards is clever. i little more hint visually as to what is clickable would be nice. i found myself clicking everywhere randomly.
This game is beautiful!! Art and music is amazing! The message of this and how it's communicated is amazing! I loved how you interact with words and the environment to unfold the story! The more abstract use of the text, made the game feel very artistic and poetic. Great job!
Not sure I have unvailed everything, but this was a moody experience. Entertain is not only entertain with joy and happyness ;) I liked playing this game, well done!
Love the look of this so much. High marks in graphics/audio and mood for sure. The way everything moved and the way the world was literally brought to life from nothing was such a joy to see and play.
This is something new after all the other games I rated, always liked to find hidden thigs in games, perhaps a list of unlocked words/clues would be an interesting idea